New anthropogenic threat to us all

[j4bberw0ck]

OK, OK, even I can't deny this one is real (http://forum.caithness.org/go.php?url=http://www.thepeoplescube.com/red/viewtopic.php?t=1668). It could explain why those windmills keep falling over.

[Metalattakk]

It all falls into place, at last. All those wobbles and stumbles - it was the ground shifting under my feet, just as I said all along! HA! And they all said I was drunk....

But what does fred say to it? Bush/Blair in cahoots to control and dominate Muslims, I'd guess. He may well be right. ;)

PM's Questions should be interesting. Broon will have to pull some rabbits out of his ...hat... to get away with this one.

Vive la Révolution!


Right. Did someone mention beer?

[Torvaig]

My stars....a sensible post at last; back to the real world you folks!;);)
N.B. TWO winking smilies....

[j4bberw0ck]

Bush/Blair in cahoots

This t-shirt also available

http://www.thepeoplescube.com/images/Founding_Fathers.gif

:lol:

[northener]

Good God,

It all makes sense now. Like Metalattak, I'd put my unsteady steps home from the Sinclair Bay Hotel down to Global Drinking - not Accelerated Continental Drift.

This could be the biggest threat to Mankind since St Winifreds' Primary School Choir sang on Top of the Pops.

Think about it, The USA is accelerating toward Australia. Australia will be accelerating towards the USA (but a lot slower, as Australians are lazy) The Yanks drive on the right, the Aussies drive on the left. Which continent will have priority when they meet?

It will be even more messy when India, with it's government-sponsored Atrocious Driving For All programme forces Switzerland to take evasive action. Even the ABS-fitted, Traction-Control and leather upholstery of the Swiss landmass cannot prevent the inevitable destruction of Mankind.

I'm off to hide in the coalshed until Brazil has gone past the window.[para]

.

[scorrie]

TUT,TUT. Very poorly researched article.

"Polar Bears in Peril

"Due to the wanton recklessness of these industrialized nations, life on earth faces both rising and falling seas as North America plows toward Asia," explained IPCD-approved geophysicist Naseem Passapotapissalong of Indonesia. "What's more, millions of polar bears will be subject to drowning as the continent drifts away from them.""
.................................................. ...

Millions of Polar Bears will NOT drown. This is because there are only 20 odd thousand of them in existence.

What a glaring error in an otherwise totally convincing article!! ;)

[j4bberw0ck]

Back to Rheghead's beloved anthropogenic threat, as opposed to one which makes similar claims on credulity.

This article (http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/bjrn_lomborg/2008/01/two_degrees_of_misrepresentati.html) makes lots of sense. The 2 deg C gerbil worming target is a political construct, free of any scientific basis.

For those who can bother themselves to read it, of course!

[Rheghead]

This article (http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/bjrn_lomborg/2008/01/two_degrees_of_misrepresentati.html) makes lots of sense. The 2 deg C gerbil worming target is a political construct, free of any scientific basis.

Can you enlighten us on what is the nature of Bjorn Lomborg's scientific credentials?

[j4bberw0ck]

Nope, I offer it as commentary, but please don't let me stop you Googling. He's sceptical about the anthropogenic nature of global warming, but then again, you appear to have swallowed it hook, line and sinker so one might argue that your rejection of his thoughts is as credible as his assertion.

Well probably less credible, given Lomborg's long experience of this area.

You repeatedly, it seems, make the classic academic error of thinking that only people with the right pieces of paper have a point of view worth considering. It's an intellectual vanity, of course, based on the idea that academics are infallible in their own field.

I imagine Einstein probably had his problems with lesser intellects who demanded to know his "scientific qualifications" :lol::lol:.

[helenwyler]

The 2 deg C gerbil worming target is a political construct, free of any scientific basis.



Thanks for the links j4bberw0ck.

I'm a bit of an amateur though, and hadn't realised gerbil worming would make any difference to the future of the planet. Does it reduce methane emissions;)?

[j4bberw0ck]

Hi Helen - yes, it's very, very important. Alongside gorbal worming, which involves old tenements and their inhabitants, global warming, which involves planets, gurning warning, which involves me, JAWS and a few others :lol: (that was meant to be lighthearted, JAWS, and a few others) and probably a few others I'll need to think on :lol:

[Rheghead]

Nope, I offer it as commentary, but please don't let me stop you Googling. He's sceptical about the anthropogenic nature of global warming, but then again, you appear to have swallowed it hook, line and sinker so one might argue that your rejection of his thoughts is as credible as his assertion.

Well probably less credible, given Lomborg's long experience of this area.

You repeatedly, it seems, make the classic academic error of thinking that only people with the right pieces of paper have a point of view worth considering. It's an intellectual vanity, of course, based on the idea that academics are infallible in their own field.

I imagine Einstein probably had his problems with lesser intellects who demanded to know his "scientific qualifications" :lol:.

I thought as much.

It seems ironic that a professor in political science should attack scientifically derived data as a political construct when he has no real science background. Not to mention he has been accused of dishonesty with his facts.

It is easy to dismiss Lomborg just on a fallacious view that he hasn't any credentials in climatic science but I don't even have to go that far, I could dismiss him purely on the fact that he hasn't contributed anything of a scientific nature at all.

Which leads me right back to your non-point about Einstein, he had no real qualifications afaik but he did make a major contribution to scientific understanding. Though on the flip side to this point, i am sure there won't be many takers for a brain operation if they knew that Bjorn lomborg was doing the operating, but hey, what do qualifications in medical science at the end of the day mean anyway? I'm sure he will be good at brain surgery once he has read a couple of books on it.:roll:

[j4bberw0ck]

Though on the flip side to this point, i am sure there won't be many takers for a brain operation if they knew that Bjorn lomborg was doing the operating, but hey, what do qualifications in medical science at the end of the day mean anyway? I'm sure he will be good at brain surgery once he has read a couple of books on it.:roll:

Tut, tut. Nope, Rheggers, won't wash. One is about the manipulation of knowledge and politics and points of view. The other is about the manipulation of someone's brain cells - in other words, it's a physical skill based on considerable theoretical knowledge. Big difference. Brain surgeons train for years to acquire both the knowledge, but more crucially, the practical physical skills. You might as well suggest that someone who's a self-taught expert in, say, archaeology, knows nothing worthwhile about it because their degree is in Mathematics.

[scorrie]

Hi Helen - yes, it's very, very important. Alongside gorbal worming, which involves old tenements and their inhabitants, global warming, which involves planets, gurning warning, which involves me, JAWS and a few others :lol: (that was meant to be lighthearted, JAWS, and a few others) and probably a few others I'll need to think on :lol:

You forgot about the Donald Trump fiasco:- "Golf ball Wangling"

[j4bberw0ck]

You forgot about the Donald Trump fiasco:- "Golf ball Wangling"

How true; I'm obliged! :lol::lol:

[Rheghead]

Tut, tut. Nope, Rheggers, won't wash. One is about the manipulation of knowledge and politics and points of view.

I agree, Bjorn Lomborg and his global warming scepticism is very well understood by scientists, but what else would you expect from a professor in political science? It is a pity he doesn't attack the science more effectively, science is all about scepticism and real scientists are the biggest sceptics of their own field.

[j4bberw0ck]

real scientists are the biggest sceptics of their own field.

Evidently not when it's climate change and associated research funding, plus jollies all over the world, on offer.

Eppur, si muove. (http://www.scienceandyou.org/articles/ess_02.shtml)

[Rheghead]

Evidently not when it's climate change and associated research funding, plus jollies all over the world, on offer.

Eppur, si muove. (http://www.scienceandyou.org/articles/ess_02.shtml)

Try not to mix up politicians and scientists. Of course if scientists are to collect global data then a certain amount of global trotting will be needed in the course of their work, but if you are on about Earth summits, Bali conventions, etc then that is the political wing of the IPCC at work to garner international support. And I agree there should be something done about it to set an example.

[j4bberw0ck]

Try not to mix up politicians and scientists.

I'm not. I'm referring to the new hybrid beast (chimaera?) which is most easily found any place there's discussion of climate change - because there's apparently no limit to the funding indulgences available if you're prepared to worship at the altar of Anthropogenic Global Warming.

It's vaguely reminiscent in some ways of the tech stocks bubble of 2000 / 2001. Limitless amounts of money being hurled at one small part of the investment spectrum led to a hyperactivity and the belief that "it was different this time". The belief that sky hooks exist. As it is with anthropogenic warming; sometime or other, the bubble will burst.

[Rheghead]

It's vaguely reminiscent in some ways of the tech stocks bubble of 2000 / 2001. Limitless amounts of money being hurled at one small part of the investment spectrum led to a hyperactivity and the belief that "it was different this time". The belief that sky hooks exist. As it is with anthropogenic warming; sometime or other, the bubble will burst.

But we are talking about a theory that has a sound scientific basis which hasn't been debunked. The evidence is compelling such as ice core data, proxy data, historical environmental records, sea level rises, recent weather patterns, satellite data and computer models. I could go on. The sceptics have absolutely NOTHING for an alternative that explains the observations. Yes, solar activity is contributing to warming, but it is akin to a candle next to the bunsen burner and doesn't explain the shortfall in energy input.

Come on, stop trawling through credulous/crank websites and do something useful like getting everyone behind combatting the biggest environmental crisis to hit mankind and our planet.

I suggest you start reading www.realclimate.net for a start, no politics on there, just mainly science, the language can be a tad esoteric, but that is the nature of the beast.

[George Brims]

...There's apparently no limit to the funding indulgences available if you're prepared to worship at the altar of Anthropogenic Global Warming.

There is no limit to the funding available to produce material arguing against anthropogenic global warming (AGW). The oil companies are perfectly happy to provide it.

I am no longer amazed, though I used to be but am now sufficiently old and cynical to have overcome that, at how people will immediately decide a piece of scientific research is or is not valid, based on their own political/social preconceptions. The first person I ever heard argue against the case for AGW used *as an argument as to why it couldn't be happening* her opinion that if it were so, then the economic consequences would be intolerable. Psychologists call this "cognitive dissonance". It explains for instance why Ford owners detest General Motors cars, and vice versa. Al Gore was obviously aware of that when he put the word "inconvenient" in the title of his documentary.

[Green_not_greed]

So its nothing to do with bombing at Cape Wrath?????? And I thought I had it sussed......

[j4bberw0ck]

The oil companies are perfectly happy to provide it.

Good. The issue is sufficiently important that there needs to be two opposing views at least; and for the same reason that for years I was a paying member of Greenpeace. I think they're a bunch of ridiculous cretins, for the most part, but I do think it's a good idea that someone shouts opposing views.


I am no longer amazed, though I used to be but am now sufficiently old and cynical to have overcome that, at how people will immediately decide a piece of scientific research is or is not valid, based on their own political/social preconceptions. The first person I ever heard argue against the case for AGW used *as an argument as to why it couldn't be happening* her opinion that if it were so, then the economic consequences would be intolerable. Psychologists call this "cognitive dissonance"
Thanks for your somewhat pompous condescension, Perfesser. I'm obliged by your cheerful confirmation that you believe that anyone but someone who agrees with you on AGW is too stupid to be able to grasp a point. Intelligent, rational people call this "intellectual snobbery".

My point, as I've said many times (but that Rheghead still fails to grasp though I live in hope he might see it one day), is NOT that I dispute global warming has occurred, although there's a body of evidence which suggest that it hasn't occurred for a few years. It is NOT that I don't believe mankind has something to do with it. It is NOT that I think it's caused by fairies. Or solar radiation. Or aerosols. Or cows farting.

It is that global warming isn't for the most part a scientific problem. It's an economic one. It'll get solved when the right reasons for people to buy in are on the table, but at the moment we just have politicians, current and failed, together with other loonies, running round forecasting doom and gloom and trying to control their way out of everything. In their desperation to be seen to be doing something, they employ economically counter-productive strategies such as - but not exclusively - market distortion by giving money to turbine developers to encourage windpower, when we already know it's monstrously inefficient and monstrously expensive power that's generated. It can't be stored. It needs about 90% of the traditional generating capacity to back it up.

I made an analogy between global warming and a leaky roof in another thread. A sensible person investigates a variety of options before deciding on how to deal with it. Global warming slaves apparently just decide to replace the roof without giving it a further thought.

[Rheghead]

It is that global warming isn't for the most part a scientific problem. It's an economic one.

You are right.

Science has no problems except in the collection of accurate data. Scientists can only record data and hypothesise and test a working model until it fall apart. This is what scientists do. So far the model has held true. No problems so far.

As for economics, it is politically led, all countries will have to deal with AGW within their own economic and political frameworks. And any measure to combat Climate Change will become part of the global economy just like party balloons have done so.

However, AGW is an ecological disaster, we have daily warnings about the icecaps melting and hurricanes, these are the real disasters. Have you forgotten New Orleans already? And what about the polar bears? And droughts? AGW is moral issue that needs to be tackled and needs to be tackled now.

At the special meeting of the Baillie windfarm, Councillor Flear said the proposal was too big for the county and would look out of place. Errr, hello? Caithness is one of the least populated areas of Scotland. This is just the sort of scientific and political naivity that is an obstacle to a low carbon economy, of which their are great economic and national security benefits.


It'll get solved when the right reasons for people to buy in are on the table, but at the moment we just have politicians, current and failed, together with other loonies, running round forecasting doom and gloom and trying to control their way out of everything. In their desperation to be seen to be doing something, they employ economically counter-productive strategies such as - but not exclusively - market distortion by giving money to turbine developers to encourage windpower,

Prevention is supposed to be better than a cure.

In the last years, domestic oil has risen from 27p/litre to over 50p/litre. Coal and gas has seen similiar rises.

Economic distortions in favour of renewable energy have little to do with recent price hikes of fuel and electricity which has not been brought on by Iraq but by competition from growing eastern economies like China and India. This all has an affect on our fuel and electricity bills.
Therefore any incentive to go 'renewable' (the RO) will have long lasting economic benefits than if we failed to act.


when we already know it's monstrously inefficient and monstrously expensive power that's generated. It can't be stored. It needs about 90% of the traditional generating capacity to back it up.

They aren't inefficient, they have a variable load factor, the average being ~25%, so you could say those that have a LF below that could be described as being 'optimally deficient'. As for your 90% back-up, a study by Stanford university suggests that if the progressive distribution system is interconnected with geographically diversed windfarms, then just over 33% of the capacity could be relied upon for baseload applications.



I made an analogy between global warming and a leaky roof in another thread. A sensible person investigates a variety of options before deciding on how to deal with it. Global warming slaves apparently just decide to replace the roof without giving it a further thought.

I disagree, the analogy may be a leaky roof but the first steps to stop the leak are the ones that are technically available in the here and now.

[j4bberw0ck]

However, AGW global warming is potentially is an ecological disaster, we have daily warnings about the icecaps melting and hurricanes, these are the real disasters.

Sorry to edit you, but let's keep this a little less emotive, shall we?

There is no credible evidence AT ALL that hurricanes are linked to global warming; predictions were made that they would be much more frequent and more violent. Experience shows this to be completely untrue. Katrina was no stronger than any other hurricane of its type.


Have you forgotten New Orleans already? In the context of global warming, yes.

And what about the polar bears? Hell's teeth Rheghead, the polar bears have survived previous warmings very handily.


And droughts? And snow where there hasn't been any before..... and the Antarctic freezing faster than the Arctic cap is melting?

AGW is moral issue Rubbish.


They aren't inefficient, they have a variable load factor :lol::lol: - yep, my boat doesn't have holes in it and a bailing pan, it has low-carbon adaptive ballast-balancing technology...........

[Rheghead]

There is no credible evidence AT ALL that hurricanes are linked to global warming;

Incorrect.

OK, tell me professor, what factors determine the force of hurricanes?:confused

I was led to believe it was the heat in warm waters that speeds up the vortex. It doesn't take much of a logical step to suggest a warming Earth will increase the magnitude of hurricanes. And that is what is predicted.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricanes#Global_warming